The lack of smaller-boat
dockage space driven by the megayacht influx, combined with the increasing
number of high-end condominiums without slips, is pushing boaters to pay
ever-higher marina fees citywide—or to invest in waterfront real
estate with dock space they can control. Many are choosing the latter,
then applying for homestead designation (which means the owner lives on
the land) that can cap property tax increases at three percent a year
no matter how much the value of the home appreciates, Terrill says.

Compare that with the
future rate increases for boats of all sizes at marinas with unquenchable
demand, he suggests. “What you have to pay for dockage for a megayacht
and a tender, you might as well own a house,” Libster agrees. She
lives on a 100-foot waterfront lot in Las Olas and believes this is the
last year homes will sell in that area for less than $1.5 million. Point
lots, at the end of canals and able to accommodate megayachts, are already
pushing $3 million for teardowns. “There’s one condominium project
in town with 150-foot slips, and they sell for $350,000,” she says.
“That’s the slip. One condo for sale with a slip like that is
$2.3 million.”

The waterfront real
estate push from boaters is so strong that Terrill sees it extending up
the New River, to neighborhoods like Riverland and Citrus Isles that can
be at least an hour’s cruise from the inlet. The houses there are
generally older and smaller, with no more than 75 feet of waterfront,
but the average price of a teardown has risen from about $300,000 a few
years ago to about $500,000 now, he says. It makes sense: People who can’t
find one large property in a prime location are buying adjacent smaller
properties up the river to accommodate their yachts.

“Without a doubt,
it’s boating that’s driving it,” Terrill says. “If
you wanted to pay $500,000 for a house that was not waterfront, you would
have a very nice, large-square-footage, new home. Instead, people are
buying much, much older homes that are teardowns or need a lot of work.”

At the end of the day,
Terrill believes Fort Lauderdale is becoming like the south of France—a
place where dock space is virtually nonexistent and where the bulk of
it is reserved for boats bigger than 80 feet. As anyone who has cruised
there knows, there's no going back once that threshold is crossed.

“In Europe many
years ago, there was a reasonable amount of space for the yachts,”
he recalls from his days in command of a 133-foot Feadship. “As the
industry grew, it got to the point where in the high season, the first
captain in who negotiated with the dockmaster might get a slip. There
were ten other yachts hanging out in the harbor on the Cote D’Azur
that had to spend the night on the anchor. That’s the way it is there
now, and that’s happening now in Fort Lauderdale.”

Looking toward the future
of dock space in Southeast Florida, today’s $1-million teardown waterfront
homes in Fort Lauderdale may indeed be quite the bargain, no matter what
size boat you own.